h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

This is going to be rather rambling, so be warned.

Our own Dr. Z put up a link on facebook to "Waterstones 50 Books to Read Before You Die" list. As I read through the list and checked off those I've already read, it occured to me that if we want modern kids to read and love books we need to make our reading lists more relevant.

Many of the titles on Waterstones list were required reading when I was in school. This was pre-computers, computer games, cable and satellite TV, DVDs, etc. We read more because there were fewer alternatives to entertain us on long winter nights. And some of those classics that were required reading in school were pretty darned hard to slog through, even for good readers. I appreciate them now, as an adult, but didn't as a student. I was always happy to finish them so I could go read something I actually enjoyed.

Books become "classics" for good reason. I'm not saying that they should be consigned to the dust heap of history. But as a librarian my main interest is getting kids to read, not to promote a particular list of books. I'd rather have them read vampire novels than nothing at all. Kids like books that are entertaining and have characters and situations they can relate to. If it's not classics quality literature, they don't care.

People who become life long readers and book lovers generally develop the habit at an early age. If all the books that are required reading in school bore them to death, they are going to equate reading in general with boredom. The notion that force feeding kids the classics will foster an appreciation of quality literature just doesn't hold water. What it really does is send them running to their TVs, computers and game consoles, because those things are fun and interesting.

Another problem I see in my area, which is oppressively conservative and fundamentalist, is the tendency for school libraries and reading lists to exclude books that are actually relevant to many kids as "not appropriate". Books about drug addiction, sexual abuse, suicide and death of family members, divorce, etc. These are things that happen to kids. Sometimes a book like Go Ask Alice is a lifeline to a kid. If assigned reading contained books about these real life problems thre would be a hue and cry reaching those of you across the pond. But these are exactly the things we should make available to kids to read.

What can I say? I agree. I don't remember much of what we read in school, but I was an avid reader from very early on (I got my library card on my first proper school day (the library was just around the corner from school). I read a lot to my sons, I always bought them books, they had a library card each from very early on, I went to the library with them regularly - but neither of them cared a lot about reading for years. my eldest son loves reading now, my youngest won't touch a book if he isn't forced to.

We didn't have much "required reading" in school - we had to read two Shakespeare plays (Julius Caesar and King Lear), and I remember reading Great Expectations in school, but nothing else. I got my love of reading by myself, when I was 8, and by living in a house with loads of books. If I had been required to read them in school, I would have hated them.

In the UK, the biggest problem that faces most children is their family splitting up, and most UK books for children face this in some way or another, particularly the books of Anne Fine and Jacqueline Wilson.

I'd also recommend fantasy books by Diana Wynne Jones and the Artemis Fowl series.

As much as I personally dislike things like vampire books, at least the kids are reading them. I'm hoping that they branch out from horror and fantasy into other genres so their reading is more balanced, but I'll keep buying them what they like. Anything to get them to read.

Well-said, Hyp.

George Takei posted a graphic about children reading earlier today on fb and I thought of you
My oldest is an avid reader, he enjoys reading assignments for class and reading on his own. The little one is okay on books, but has a very short attention span. I think by his age (7) I was halfway through the second Harry Potter with my oldest, the youngest just can't sit still through a chapter and stay focused on the story. I'm hoping that improves as he gets older.

I was talking about kids books with some co-workers last week, because one colleague can't seem to find anything that his son finds entertaining enough to stick with. Kids are so inundated with stimuli, they just don't want to make the effort to conjure images in their heads to go along with a book when they can just wait for the movie to come out and save themselves hours of gaming time.

We had loads of required reading. I think the assignment I disliked the most was Moby Dick.

broe, that's what I love about books. You have to use your imagination. Once a character is cast in a movie, then that's the image people have. It might be totally different that the one they created themselves. This is why I always hesitate before seeing a film version of a book I particularly like. I don't want someone else's images stuck in my head.

I worry that a lot of today's kids will lack imagination. Makes me wonder what the future will be like in the hands of a generation that relies on constant stimuli (as opposed to those that had to create their own stimuli).

Hyp, I actually have a separate image of many characters from books that are also movies. Snape in Harry Potter comes immediately to mind as does Richard Cypher/Rahl from Sword of Truth. But I do understand your point.

My kids both initially disliked reading immensely. As time went on they both became avid readers, something I am very glad of.

Agreed. That's a real concern. Kids don't seem to know how to entertain themselves any more.

Zomnker, I can't imagine kids of yours not reading.

Okay, full disclosure: I LIKED all the required reading we had. It meant somebody had to lend me a book.

Nobody had the temerity to try and make us read 'Moby Dick' back then.

I enjoyed the stuff we read in school - Conrad, Dickens, Shakespeare, even George Eliot, whom my English teacher disliked. Heinlein, Saki, O Henry...my complaint was that we didn't get enough. I mean, a measily one or two poems by Robert Burns, then I had to go to the library and find more...a few poems by ee cummings, one story by Heinlein (and you know which one)...

My sister, two years younger, got all the new teachers. It was the early 70s. They were 'relevant'. What did they teach?

'The Great White Hope', a play about boxing and racism, rather adult stuff.
'Johnny Got His Gun', by Dalton Trumbo, about a World War I soldier who loses all his limbs, his face, his sight, and his hearing. Told from his point of view. (I recommend the film, but come on...)
'The Crucible', by Arthur Miller, about McCarthyism, disguised as being about witches. Really exciting stuff for kids.
'Endgame', by SAMUEL BECKETT. (Sis' review of seeing the Pitt Drama Department perform this play was much, much funnier than anything the great absurdist ever wrote.)

No wonder my sister hated to read. How could you DO that to a teenager? All that 'social relevance' drove her away.

Her favourite book was 'Freckles', by Gene Stratton Porter. Beautiful book, if you have tears, prepare to shed them now.

Were you in Pennsylvania in those days, Dmitri? We did read a couple of Shakespeare plays and his sonnets. I think that's all from your list that would apply to my schooling.

So you don't think relevance is of any importance?

Gene Stratton Porter. That takes me back.

We're currently reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - great for building a love of chapter books! The suspense when we stopped on the chapter before he opened his birthday chocolate! The sadness when it didn't have a golden ticket! The joy when he *did* find one!

I couldn't be enjoying this more...

...oh and the boys are having fun too

Kelli, all kids seem to love that book. I've had to buy replacement copies over the years.

Hypatia, I agree with every word. I was fortunate to learn to read early, and being an only child it was an escape in to the bigger world. At nine I was begging for Dickens books as birthday presents, and one bookshop assistant said the books were far too old for me - I soon told her!! I loved the classics and still have many of them, in spite of being 'encouraged' to get rid of all these books!

I loved Shakespeare at school, and I was always chapters ahead with any set reading, which meant writing about it afterwards was easier. I still adore books, and couldn't bare the thought that such as the Kindle could see the end of books. No chance, whatever anyone says!

I was lucky that my parents didn't censor my reading, so I read anything I could lay my hands on. Reading under the blankets by torch light was probably the reason I was often late for school!! You soon learn what is good writing and you also learn from bad writing. Spelling gets better too. We read to both our sons, and woe betide if we changed a word or skipped a few lines!!

I have come back to reading big time since being widowed. Reading in bed wasn't allowed before !

I have not read any of the Harry Potter books but I am convinced they are getting children reading again, and I am in favour of 'page turners' with 'cliff hangers' to keep them interested.

Frankly, anything to keep them away from some of the unwholesome stuff to be found on the Internet these days.



Websailor

'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory', yum. All of Roald Dahl.

Yeah, Hypatia, that was in western Pennsylvania. We read a Shakespeare play per year, and two one year. Great. (And I could tell my dad, 'We HAVE to watch the play on TV. It's for SCHOOL.' So he couldn't turn it off.)

Nah, I think relevance is something kids should reach by the back door.

You wanna get kids to think about problems? Read 'Charlie'. Then talk about socioeconomics...

You want to be subversive? Give 'em the original 'Mary Poppins' novels. Travers was a student of Gurdjieff. Mary Poppins is the Sophia...it's all mysticism.

You want to increase environmental awareness? Read Gene Stratton Porter. Then go look at a map of Michigan.

Our last book was The Twits, but the one before that was The Lorax - Dr Seuss. Longer than the Gruffalo type books but still a one-sitting book. Lots of social commentery there which t'Boy surprised me by drawing a parallel between the story and big corporations in the real world.

But I guess my boys are too little for this thread yet. I will take notes for stuff to make sure we have on the shelves - they both have book cases with all their own books on the bottom shelves - on higher ones that they can see but not grab from are the chapter books waiting for them, including stuff like the Harry Potters, Phillip Pullman, 'classics' that I still have knocking about (Robinson Crusoe, Little Women, The Secret Garden, The Hobbit etc), Terry Pratchett's Truckers, Diggers and Wings. My hope is that as they get more confident with reading they might choose things to get down and read for themselves, and it is my job to make sure there are loads of great books to choose from.

I got my love for reading very early. I can still remember the books that really hooked me. Socks, by Beverly Cleary [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socks_%28Beverly_Cleary%29 ] was one of the first books I owned. I absolutely loved this book. Later, I remember being assigned The Pushcart War [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pushcart_War ]. We had to answer various questions regarding our comprehension of the various stories we read and give a short summary in class. It was the SECOND time I suspected a teacher of being WRONG! My teacher marked me off when I answered that I felt this story was "realist fiction" rather than "fantasy". I seriously didn't find anything in that book fantastic. I'd never been anywhere near a big city, but I knew they had big trucks and I could definitely imagine such a social battle occurring. And I knew from fantasy as well, because the book I WASN'T assigned but was reading at the time was The Phantom Tollbooth, [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Phantom_Tollbooth ]. I really loved that story. I so wanted to escape the real world then. Even if it meant facing horrible puns.

The first time I suspected a teacher of being wrong was in kindergarten or maybe first grade when I got a bad mark for coloring a rabbit in with blue crayon. I didn't protest, but I was very hurt though. The only rabbit I'd ever seen was blue in the copy of the book I had at home, The Velveteen Rabbit. [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Velveteen_Rabbit ]


BTW, Dmitri? Which Heinlein story was it? I had to discover Heinlein on my own in high school. The first book I read, and still my favorite of his today was Job: A Comedy of Justice [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Job:_A_Comedy_of_Justice ]. For the next several years, I searched for every book and story of his I could find, mostly at the local used bookstore (Half Priced Books). I believe I found all but two short stories that are long out of print.

Dmitri, what I want is for kids who already have problems and no one to talk to about them to have books to read with characters experiencing similar things. Books written for kids and young adults, not The Great White Hope.

Websailor, I used to read under the covers with a flashlight, too. And I simply adored Dickens. I remember the librarian at the library I work at now limiting me to one book per day on my weekly visits as a kid. If I tried to sneak in the 8th book, she always caught me and made me put one back. I thought that was the height of cruelty. Fortunately, we had loads of books at home all the time.

Kelli, they've sort of gone out of fashion, but the John Bellairs books are good chapter books.